The history of Muscle Shoals as a hotbed of artistic creation is an interesting one, where one studio became two, and totally put this random town in northwest Alabama on the musical map.
The story starts with Rick Hall, a musician and songwriter based out of Florence, Alabama. He had written a few minor hits, including Sweet and Innocent (Roy Orbison) and She'll Never Know (Brenda Lee), before entering a partnership with Tom Stafford and local saxophonist, Billy Sherrill - to create Stafford Publishing And Recording (SPAR).
But the relationship didn't last long, at least for Hall, and he was kicked out of the partnership in 1961, and decided to take out a loan to buy an abandoned warehouse. The warehouse became the first FAME studio (Florence Alabama Music Enterprises).
Muscle Shoals #1
The first house band at FAME consisted of Norbert Putnam on bass, David Briggs on keyboards and Jerry Carrigan on drums. The first hit produced out of the studio was You Better Move On, which reached number 24 on the US charts for former local bellhop, Arthur Alexander. A reputation started to grow and soon this unlikely southern town was attracting some top musicians - Tommy Roe was a regular here in the early days.
Arthur Alexander: You Better Move On - here
(Audio only)
The money coming in allowed Hall to move the studio in 1962 to nearby 603 Avalon Avenue (where it still is). The first FAME line up didn't last long though, and soon Briggs, Carrigan and Putnam had been lured away to the big studios of Nashville (100 miles to the north).
Muscle Shoals #2 (The Swampers)
Over 1963-64, Hall started to assemble a new core in-house band, that would eventually consist of Roger Hawkins (drums), David Hood (bass), Jimmy Johnson (guitar) and Barry Beckett (keyboards). While other musicians would be involved (like legendary keys player Spooner Oldham), this was the group that would be known as The Second FAME Gang, and then more famously as The Swampers.
This last moniker was apparently coined by producer Denny Cordell when he was producing the band backing Leon Russell, for their "funky, soulful Southern swamp sound." They would later be enshrined in musical folklore after Lynyrd Skynyrd had worked with them. Their most famous anthem, Sweet Home Alabama, includes the lines:
"Now Muscle Shoals has got the Swampers,
And they've been known to pick a song or two.
Lord they got me off so much, they pick me up when I'm feeling blue."
Lynyrd Skynyrd: Sweet Home Alabama - here
(Live at Oakland Coliseum, 1977)
This second period at FAME included work with some of the greatest R&B and Soul players of the time. Jerry Wexler of Atlantic Records particularly liked bringing his talent down to Alabama. Wilson Pickett did Mustang Sally with them, Percy Sledge recorded Take Time To Know Her, and the Staple Singers and Bob Dylan would also come through town.
But all good thing come to an end, and following a financial dispute, The Swampers left Hall behind in 1969 - going on to set up their own studio (more on that later). David Hood recalled in a 2014 interview in No Treble, "We knew we could only go so far with Rick as a rhythm section for FAME... For us, it was a convenient time, though it wasn't for Rick because he needed us more than he let on. We wanted to do better, to make more money playing on hit records, and to share in some of the profits. We were young and eager, so when the studio became available, we thought that was the time to do it."
Muscle Shoals #3
The New FAME Gang that Hall put together featured Jesse Bryce on bass, Freeman Brown on drums, Junior Lowe on guitar, Clayton Ivey on keyboards and a four piece brass section.
Hall was no longer dealing with Atlantic by this point, and instead managed to secure work with Capitol Records, and this meant that the FAME Gang were instrumental in propelling the Osmonds to success, through their hit One Bad Apple.
The 1970s and 80s saw FAME largely working with country musicians like Bobbie Gentry, Jerry Read and the Gatlin Brothers. More recently other more blues oriented bands like Drive By Truckers and Jason Isbell have recorded there.
The Aretha Story
Aretha Franklin's career had not been progressing all that well. The mid-60s saw her singing easy pop-jazz tunes for Columbia Records, before Atlantic took her on in 1967.
Jerry Wexler took her down to see Rick Hall and the gang at FAME. It seemed to start well. Franklin sat at the piano, and with Spooner Oldham accompanying her on his Wurlitzer piano, they got something going. He figured out an intro and Franklin got the words going - "You're a no good heartbreaker. You're a liar and a cheat." I Never Loved A Man (The Way I Love You) was born, which would eventually become a number 9 hit and be the title track of her breakout album that really showcased her raw power.
But that was in the future. Back at the recording session, things started to turn. Franklin's husband and manager, Ted White, was by all accounts not a very nice man (the aforementioned song may well be about him). He brought a bottle of vodka into the studio and was sharing it with the horn section. Suddenly he was confronting Hall in the control room - "I want you to fire the trumpet player, He's making passes at my wife." The trumpet player was reluctantly told to go home, but soon White was back with the same accusation against the tenor sax player.
At the end of the day, only that one song was in the can and things were clearly tense, so Wexler cancels the session. Hall told Wexler, "I'm going over to the hotel where they're staying and work this out. We'll have a drink together and we'll talk it out and everything will be fine tomorrow." Wexler told him in no uncertain terms that this was a bad idea. Hall went anyway. Hall and White came to blows at the hotel and Wexler announced that they were off and not coming back again.
That marked the end of Atlantic's relationship with FAME, although ironically, the Swampers were called up to New York to help Franklin finish the album off.
Muscle Shoals Sound Studios
When the Swampers left Hall and FAME behind, they managed to secure a loan from Atlantic Records to buy the studio on North Jackson Highway (technically in Sheffield, a town that blends into Muscle Shoals). As well as calling it Muscle Shoals Sound Studios, the group would also copyright themselves as the Muscle Shoals Rhythm Section.
In 1969, the same year they opened the doors, they got a visit from the Rolling Stones, who popped in for a few heady days, during which time (with Jimmy Johnson engineering) they knocked out songs including Brown Sugar and Wild Horses.
The Rolling Stones: Wild Horses - here
(Live - year unknown)
The first record cut there to get a release though, was Cher's solo album which she called 3614 Jackson Highway. The first Gold record came with R.B. Greaves' US number 2 hit, Take A Letter, Maria.
Atlantic asked the Swampers in 1971 to move down to Miami to continue working with their acts, but the group refused. The irate record company recalled the remainder of the loan, and they only survived because Stax Records were also struggling financially, and decided to farm much of their work out to the studio. A busy period included recording the Staple Singers I'll Take You There and Paul Simon's Kodachrome.
The Staple SIngers: I'll Take You There - here
(Official lyric video)
On the move again
They closed the studio on Jackson Highway down in 1979, moving it to 1000 Alabama Avenue. It was the old Sheffield Armory, which the town offered at a discount rate, to prevent them moving the studio elsewhere. One of the first records laid down at this new place was Bob Dylan's Slow Train Coming. As the 70s turned into the 80s, the band moved more into production and did less playing. Eventually they closed the business down in 1985 - selling it on to Tommy Couch (the owner of Malaco Records in Jackson, Mississippi).
Bob Dylan: Slow Train - here
(Official audio - song includes Mark Knopfler on lead guitar)
The original Jackson Highway building had an interesting narrative. After the Muscle Shoals gang left it became an audio retailer and then an appliance repair store, before being abandoned in the late 1990s. But it has since been renovated and now operates as a museum and recording studio (The Black Keys recorded their 2009 album Brothers there). The Alabama Avenue site now operates as Cypress Moon studio.
(Photos from MuscleShoalSoundStudio.org )